Already 1-0 down thanks to an early Ian Taylor goal, a seemingly innocuous back pass to Roche from fellow youngster Wes Morgan appeared to be nothing more than a formality as the Irishman set himself to pump the ball back down the pitch.

What happened next will forever be etched into East Midlands folklore with Roche and Forest being the butt of jokes for years to come.

Paul Peschisolido scores against Forest (Image: Derby Telegraph)

On a windy, cold March afternoon, Morgan’s pass hit a stray cup which then deceived Roche, leaving him to slice his kick up in the air and straight into the path of master finisher Paul Peschisolido.

The diminutive Rams striker had the simple task of volleying the ball into the net to give Derby a 2-0 lead – and to make matters worse, it happened in front of the near 5,000 strong travelling support amassed behind the goal - who watched in disbelief and no shortage of abject despair at what had unfolded right in front of their eyes.

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“The only saving grace looking back on it now was that there was no social media, because I think if there were things like Twitter back then, I’d have had to shut off my phone for a few months,” said Roche, reflecting on his experience with the Post.

“It was very difficult.

“For it to happen in any game it would have been bad enough, but for it to happen at Pride Park against that lot, it made it all the more difficult.

“I’ll be honest, it took me quite a bit of time to recover from it.”

Roche, now 36 and having celebrated his 500th Football League appearance playing for Morecambe at Notts County last season, admits that if such a situation arose now, he’d be in a very different place to deal with it.

“I hope it doesn’t happen now, but if something like that did happen now, obviously it’d be hard to take but as an older goalkeeper with a bit more experience, you can get over things a bit better, but as a young goalkeeper, I’ll be honest, I found it very difficult to come to terms with it," he added.

Jordan Smith will be hoping for no such drama on Sunday (Image: Ritchie Sumpter @ JMS Photography)

“I’ve made plenty of mistakes in my career and some of them do take a little bit longer to get over than others."

More than 14 years on from that fateful derby day, which saw Forest end up losing 4-2, Roche admits he’s still raw about that moment in the 29th minute.

“When you’ve been through something like that, with 25,000, 30,000 people in the stadium, what a big game it was, it’s happened and as I look back on it now, I’m still not at the laughing stage about it," he said.

“It’s one of those things.

“(Though) when people bring it up and take the mickey, it doesn’t bother me.”

Roche later received a present for Christmas and probably wasn’t expecting what was to follow when he gleefully unwrapped it on Christmas morning.

“I got for Christmas one year, David Seaman’s goalkeeping bloopers and thought, ‘oh yes, I’ll have a look at that’ – and low and behold, there’s me against Derby County," he said.

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Following that game in 2004, there was much speculation that the Rams had indeed put the honorary coffee cup in their trophy cabinet to mark the occasion, and Roche has his own thoughts on that.

A cup similar to this was found on the Pride Park pitch after the game

“Someone told me that they put it in their trophy cabinet and I thought, surely they can’t have," he said.

“They’re certainly setting their standards high, aren’t they?”

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As Forest and Costel Pantilimon prepare to face Derby at Pride Park on Monday evening, the former Reds stopper admits that despite that unfortunate event, he’d much rather have gone through it to have played for the Reds against the Rams on such a special occasion.

“At the time I didn’t want it to happen, but I’d rather have been on that pitch playing and playing in the Championship in front of 25,000 than sitting on the bench or not even involved, so there’s now plenty of positives to take from it," he said.